Jane
by Vendelyn Silverhawk
Summary: What if Jane didn't stay put, and came to New York during the invasion? What if, in the midst of all the chaos, a very tired God of Mischief found her in the rubble, and saw an end beyond imprisonment, and retribution for his war crimes? Ah, the fates are cruel. Lokane One-Shot Challenge by Alydia Rackham.


**A/N:** This is one of my Lokane one-shots for Queen Alydia Rackham's Lokane One-Shot Weekend Challenge for the opening weekend of Thor 2 (Yay!). This is a similar concept to her Lokane one-shot "Shattered," but my spin on it, and also another Lokane fanfiction that I read a long time ago and can't find again, but as soon as I do locate it, it will be credited here as inspiration. However, aside from borrowing these core concepts, it is my own work.

Smoke and sirens filled New York on the day the Chitauri attacked, covering the city like so many ants on a fallen crumb. Wind whipped around corners, ferrying the smoke to wherever it would do the most harm; into the lungs of scrambling citizens, the eyes of the Avengers as they fought off the hordes, the streets rendered almost unnavigable by all of the destruction. It was a wonder anyone kept track of themselves let alone their family and friends, which is why, in the rubble of a small, obscure building no one ever noticed- courtesy of SHIELD- or, if they did, remembered, the body of one woman among hundreds was overlooked.

The fight had been going strong for almost three hours, and emergency personnel had been funneled into the city to help evacuate and treat the severely injured, protected by police and buildings unlikely to go down from a little laser fire. Near one of these aid-stations, the madman himself happened to crash, thrown off the stage at a pinnacle moment in the battle. Not that he was complaining.

Loki's head was pounding, his body ached and his mind strained at the mental shackles that had crippled him for- how long had it been? And when? Where? That was the problem; he knew nothing, only that it burned and the sight of Thor and his precious Avengers filled him with fury that drove every other rational thought from his normally meticulous brain. Lying next to him the chitauri glider sputtered and died, sparks and liquid flying over Loki's battered body. He was so tired…

_Scrtch. Scrtch. Scrtch_. Memories of bloody fingers scraping stone, silent screams echoing behind a mouth sewn shut, and darkness consuming flashed across Loki's eyelids. That sound was one he had made before.

Turning his head and opening his eyes, the god was shocked to see a small woman, in the rubble of the half-collapsed building, next to him. Her long brown hair was matted with debris, and her small hands weakly scratched against the rubble pinning her between the wall and floor. Her eyelids fluttered like the wings of a dying bird; Loki could feel her racing rabbit heart in his bones, senses hyper-sensitive to everything going on around him, even though he wanted to shut it all out.

He closed his eyes and resolutely turned away. How long before he was compelled to re-enter the battle and duel his brother once more? The thought no longer held much attraction for him.

_Scrrrrrrrrrrtch._ That sound again! Flinching, Loki attempted to rid his mind of those memories, that time when he had worked his fingers raw trying to escape an underground prison. Six years there and he had never stopped trying. This little woman was just as tenacious; lying on the edge of death and still fighting.

He couldn't help it; Loki looked at her again.

And found himself caught in her depthless brown eyes, not filled with pain, but a question.

"Help… me." She whispered, stretching out a hand with fingers beginning to be worn by her scrabbling at the rocks. A drop of blood hung on the edge of her mouth.

There is no telling what made Loki move, or why he cared in that moment to console this fading woman. Nevertheless, he got up and strode towards her, ignoring the pounding in his ears insisting he lead his army. With one shove of his hands the rubble collapsed from her, rolling down a broken slope of wall and freeing her to roll onto the floor.

Instead, she collapsed into his arms and, surprised by her weight for such a tiny thing, knocked Loki to the ground. Her head against his chest, she breathed deeply, eyes focusing on the ceiling past his face. As she overcame the pain and came back to herself, Loki looked at the part of her body previously covered by rubble. Blood coated a dark-blue shirt decorated with the constellations, leaking from a large gash in the middle of Orion. One of her ankles was twisted in an odd direction, and her entire body was bruised and, for all intents and purposes, crippled by pain.

His brow knit in concentration, pale hand hovering over her midsection. Like x-rays images of the internal damage flashed before his eyes, and when she finally looked at him, having slumped into his lap, he could not meet her eyes.

"Thank you." She breathed, hands pressing the wound at her side futilely. It was a wonder, Loki mused, that she hadn't gone into shock or just died already.

Unable to find the right words to follow that, Loki just looked at her, analyzing every part of her but her eyes, as they sat for what could have been eons or seconds. A war raged around them, people screamed and sirens wailed and alien star-whales moaned as they were felled, but all Loki could think about was what a striking figure this woman must have been before his petty war broke her.

Fwoom. A blast from a Chitauri laser slammed into the wall centimeters above the woman's stomach, causing her to flinch violently and then clench her teeth; probably to keep from screaming. That woke Loki enough for him to realize that it wasn't safe.

Of course it isn't safe. He scoffed at himself. You brought the war.

But before he could think of what he was doing he was standing on the edge of the building with the woman in his arms, jumping. He is the pavement without a sound, beginning the mindless trek to the aid-station not a hundred yards away.

"Y-you aren't like they said." The woman choked out past the blood dripping from her lips. Loki's eyes mirrored the confusion in her own, but he couldn't ask her to clarify past the lump in his throat. She was using the last of her strength to tell him that he had defied expectations.

"And what am I like?" He finally managed, not realizing that he had stopped walking.

The woman reached out a hand and laid her bloodstained fingers against his cheek. Pain clouded her eyes at the gesture, yet she refused to let them drop. Her entire body was trembling; the spot of blood on her chest had stretched scarlet across her entire waist.

"Kind," she breathed.

Loki's heart skipped a beat.

"I am not kind, mortal- look around you. This destruction is my doing, as is your death." It was a weak sneer- he didn't have the effort to put sufficient venom into it. Having a conversation with the dying woman had drained him, especially because she was a direct consequence of his actions that he hadn't expected to have to face.

"No- this isn't you." Her hand finally dropped, and her mouth filled with blood which she couldn't help coughing up on his armor. Red spittle stained his cheek and steamed, but he didn't feel it.

"How could an ant like you know me?" That was what he wanted to say.

But, "The real me is even more monstrous," was all that made it past his lips.

"Liar."

He couldn't help but snort at that, and a small smile wormed its way onto his face at this tiny woman's stubbornness.

There was nothing to say in reply, so he didn't. Loki just reminded his feet where they were going and tried not to hear the faint beating of her heart, the wetness of the blood on his skin, the tremors that wracked her fragile body.

Ash swirled past them like snow, and the closer they got to the medical center, the closer the woman's spirit got to Helheim's gate. Her glazed eyes reflected each clump of ash, but the way she smiled and reached out shivering fingers to catch them would have almost convinced Loki that it was snow. It reminded him painfully of the winters in Asgard, when he and Thor spent hours in the snow. That was back when they were still brothers, still friends; when pure, childish intentions were enough to dissolve any quarrel.

"It's funny," the woman whispered, so soft that Loki strained to hear. "I'm surrounded by people, by superheroes, and you're the only one who stopped to help me."

"If I was helping you, you wouldn't be dying." Loki snapped. On the outskirts of the medical facility was an ambulance with a rolled-out gurney. Lying her upon it as gently as he could amidst the frantic crowd, Loki lingered by her side, unable to comprehend why waging war against the Avengers seemed so unappealing next to staying with her in their small bubble of calm.

No one noticed the dying woman or her shadowy deliverer.

"But I'm not dying alone." There was no doubt that she had minutes left. Her heartbeat raced against her chest as the warmth began to fade from her body. Her eyes drifted shut. "I'm glad it was you… Thor would have fought. Would have scolded me for not staying away." A small smile twitched on her lips.

At his brother's name, Loki's blood went cold. This mortal knew Thor. But how? Loki grabbed her hand tightly in his and cupped her cheek, breathing cold air to wake her up. Icicles began to form on her long lashes by the time her eyes fluttered open.

"What are you to Thor?" He demanded, willing her to hang on, to stay alive and explain why she, a mortal woman insignificant in the grand scheme of the universe, believed Thor would argue her passing more than any other creature.

Her brow furrowed at the question. "I never did find out. It doesn't matter, though."

"It does," Loki insisted, suddenly seized by a fervor that would not let this woman die and leave him with more questions. He had enough of those already- foremost why he had done this for one mortal, and why she let him, the man who had essentially killed her.

"Tell me why!" Her bright smile went through his soul like lightning, illuminating the darkest regions and widest cracks. "Tell me your name."

"You're better than the Avengers give you credit for. I wish I could tell them that…" Despite his shaking her shoulders and stroking her cheek and pleading for her to wake up, she did not, and the last thing she said made him want to throw her from the table and forbid her to die, though it was already long too late.

"I think I see the stars," her voice was barely there, a shade of what it should have been. "I remember that he told me… you love the stars, too… Loki." Her last words were the tipping point to madness.

In a nanosecond rage raced through him, searing his body with the fury of a wildfire, but when her hand went cold in his it all burned out. There was nothing left inside of him but the question, beating a tempo against him mind.

_Why?_

He bent down and placed a numb kiss on her brow-

_Warm brown eyes looked down on him in amusement as the woman stretched out one tiny hand to help him to his feet._

_ Blood coated his body- and hers- because they were trapped and surrounded by enemies on all sides._

_ A journey stretched before them, filled with adventures and risk that would be faced with friends beside them._

_ The woman, clothed in a dress like the night sky itself, stroked a stomach round with child and gave a smile that shamed the light of the torches glowing all around her._

_ He knelt next to an unmarked grave and sobbed. _

Feelings, images, scenarios flashed in his mind as numerous as the ash clouds around him. Stumbling back from the gurney and the woman's dead body, Loki's eyes were wide in shock. Seeing her dead filled him with a dull ache and grief as vast as the sky and deep as the sea. It was as if the brightest star in the heavens had been snuffed out; Loki could feel the future that had been stolen slipping through his fingers, shattering into a million pieces.

Loki stumbled away from the gurney, tears streaming down his face, and wondered dimly why the army was still attacking this worthless Midgardian city as if the sky had not gone dark and the will for life to continue had not been wiped from existence.

Later he saw the footage from New York as he sat within his cell, waiting for Thor to retrieve the Tesseract from Fury. Among the face of the dead was the woman, and her name.

Jane.

_Review!_


End file.
